Carlson scores 21 as Utah overwhelms Long Island to earn 89-48 season-opening win

SALT LAKE CITY — There were some ebbs and flows to Utah's season opener against Long Island on a late Monday night.

It was about as expected in the first game of the season, but Utah ultimately controlled the game and started off Craig Smith's second year with the program with an 89-48 win at the Huntsman Center.

"It's always good to start off with the win," senior Branden Carlson said. "I just think the team competed really hard today; I think we played well together."

Carlson wasted no time to set the tone and scored 6 of the team's first 8 points, and it was all Utah (1-0) from there as the Sharks struggled to contend with a more physical team on both ends of the floor. The Utes eventually built up a 16-point lead with seven minutes left to play in the half and seemingly hit cruise control.

Smith mixed up the lineups to get different looks, and suddenly the Sharks couldn't miss and capitalized on a few Utah miscues. Long Island (0-1) went on an 11-1 run, and Smith was forced to sub in his starters to closeout the first half.

Once in, Carlson got back to business and hit a shot that was followed up by a 3-pointer from Gabe Madsen, and Utah controlled a 42-28 lead at the halftime break despite shooting only 39% from the field.

"I thought we steadied the ship to end the first half, but we just talked quite frankly with our guys at halftime at some simple adjustments that we needed to make, and I thought we did," Smith said.

Madsen started the second half with a 3-pointer, and the scoring commenced for a Runnin' Utes team that built up its lead to as much as 41 points. The Sharks had no answer. Even as Utah emptied its bench, Long Island could get no closer than a 33-point deficit.

The early effort on Monday was complicated by the fact that Utah had no tape on Long Island and had no real preparation from the Rod Strickland-led team in his return to college basketball. Carlson said the team knew some "tendencies" of the players, but didn't have much else to go off in their preparation.

"I don't ever recall going into a game where we didn't have walkthrough, because we literally had no clue what they were going to do, because coach Strickland hasn't been in college basketball for, I think, four years, and so you're just kind of guessing," Smith said.

"It was a lot different than we ever had before, because we had like no scout on them except for like some personnel tips. ... We got really good at knowing like people's tendencies, but, yeah, we had no idea on how they ran things," Carlson said. "We just kind of had to go off of just what we've heard and stuff like that. It was just a lot different, but I think the team did a really good job of just like locking in and just kind of coming out and ready to go."

Utah was led in scoring by Carlson, who had a highlight reel night with multiple dunks and blocks, and a 3-pointer to give the home crowd something extra to cheer about in a blowout game. He finished with 21 points on 10-of-16 shooting before being subbed out of the game with just over seven minutes left to play. Carlson added 10 rebounds and three blocks in the win.

In all, Utah had five players in double figures, including Madsen's 13 points and three rebounds, Rollie Worster's 11 points and five rebounds, Mike Saunders Jr.'s 11 points, and Wilguens Exacte's 12 points and six rebounds. Utah also got 37 points from its bench and outrebounded Long Island 53-34 in a total team effort.

Utah was without senior Marco Anthony on Monday, who was held out due to a lower-leg injury sustained during practice a week before an exhibition contest against Westminster last week. Anthony was expected to return to the lineup on Monday, but had a setback. Smith said "we'll see what happens here but he may miss a little bit of time."

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